Livestock, such as horses, mules, donkeys, cattle and the like, when in natural environments will ordinarily graze or feed for long periods of time during a day. It is desirable to maintain the animal's overall health by trying to replicate this natural daily feeding pattern when the animal in captivity is not pasture kept. When the animal is kept in captivity in a more confined space such as a paddock, barn, corral and the like, the animal's desired gazing pattern may be assisted by generally feeding the animal several times a day at regular timed intervals. This daily repeated feeding pattern may be also employed when such an animal is not well (e.g., having an ulcerated digestive tract) and is required to eat small amounts of food repeatedly provided during the day in order to heal and get better. Providing such regulated repeated animal feeding during a day may require a significant amount of the animal owner's time and capability. Sickness, work schedules, away vacations and emergencies that may impact the owner may also interfere with the owner provided daily repeated animal feedings as well.
One possible solution to overcome such feeding issues could be an automated animal feed dispenser that could automatically and repeatedly dispense a premeasured amount of the animal's feed to the area where the animal is found or kept according to a desired feeding schedule. These animal feed dispensers may have reliability issues in that they may get jammed or otherwise fail to reliably deliver feed to the animals. What could be needed therefor is a dependable and reliable automated animal feed dispenser that may utilize a simple and efficient food delivery mechanism.
One such possible solution to these issues could be the present invention, an automated animal feed dispenser that could utilize drop shelving (e.g., that may operate through the force of gravity) to increase operational reliability. Such an automated animal feed dispenser could feature a three-sided cabinet with a hollow interior. The cabinet could generally be formed by a cabinet middle wall connecting to two cabinet end walls to form an open rear or back side that is opposite the cabinet middle wall. The bottom of the cabinet's middle wall could denote a feed delivery slot that further connects to a bottom of an angled slide located within the cabinet's interior. Located over the angled slide and within a cabinet interior could be a vertically stacked set of spaced-apart drop shelves or flaps. Each respective drop shelf could have a first edge and a second edge, the first edge could be connected to a rod, the rod substantially being located between and movably connecting to the two cabinet end walls, allowing the drop shelf to generally pivot about the rod/first edge. The opposing second edge could interact with a respective motorized latch located on an inner or back side of the cabinet's middle wall. The motorized latch could engage and hold a respective drop shelf in a horizontal orientation.
Each motorized latch could be further connected to a power source through a programmable electronic latch control system comprising a sequencer circuit and a timer circuit that functions drop the respective motorized latches in a timed top-to-bottom order on a programmable feeding schedule (e.g., providing for repeated feed drops during the day.) When the motorized latch is activated, the motorized latch could release a respective second edge to allow the respective drop shelf to pivot downward by its hinged first edge to drop the animal feed that is stored upon the drop shelf.
As the feed drops down into the cabinet, the feed would hit and then be guided by the angled slide to the feed delivery slot to exit the cabinet's hollow interior. As the drop shelving drops down in its sequence, that drop shelf that drops next could angularly overlay the earlier and below dropped drop shelf to collectively form a progressively angled slide that further assists the feed's delivery movement down to the angled slide and out the dispenser.